In an effort to make progress on the question of whether to build a new fire station behind the current one or procure land elsewhere, the Permanent Building Committee plans to ask the Select Board for funds to compare site costs for those two options. Fire Chief Rick Sicard and the committee are currently considering a parcel of land on the corner of Ayer and Depot roads as a possible location for a new station. The committee’s current plan is to ask the town to negotiate with the owner of that property to allow it to do test borings, and to possibly take the parcel off the market, at least temporarily, while that work is being done. That will require funds.
Complicating the problem is that the town has not yet voted to fund the design of a new station on any site. The Capital Planning and Investment Committee voted not to recommend $300,000 in fiscal 2025 for that design, in part because a location had not yet been chosen, and the site would be a big factor in the design. The fire station project is currently on the capital schedule for fiscal 2027.
Pablo Carbonell, chair of the Permanent Building Committee, said Sicard is preparing an estimated cost to make the land behind the current station buildable, using information from a study done by architectural firm Kaestle Boos Associates in 2019. He also said he would like Assistant Town Administrator Marie Sobalvarro to look into the possibility of contracting Kaestle Boos to do test borings on the Ayer Road site, should the town be granted access to do so, without violating procurement laws. Sobalvarro told the Press she could not contact the architectural firm to do any further work unless funding was in place.
Permanent Building Committee members and the town’s building inspector, Jeff Hayes, agreed that the Ayer Road site would be preferable to the existing site, not just because the latter area is riddled with ledge, but also because of its proximity to the parking areas that serve Town Hall and the Unitarian Church. They also recognized that, to make a convincing case for purchasing land for a new station, they would need concrete numbers for an apples-to-apples comparison of both sites that are under consideration.
The committee will try to get on the agenda for the Select Board’s Jan. 23 meeting to ask for funds to get the numbers it needs to make an informed site recommendation to the town. Should that recommendation be to purchase land, it will be up to the town to decide if it is willing to make that purchase in advance of a vote to design a new station.
